Thursday, 20 November 2008

Elisabeth Sladen (The Sarah Jane Adventures) Interview

The Sarah Jane Adventures aired in a Christmas pilot in 2006 and then as a series on CBBC in 2007 and is currently half way through it's second series. Elisabeth Sladen first played Doctor Who companion Sarah Jane Smith in 1973 in along side Jon Pertwee. The character of Sarah Jane returned to the Doctor Who fold in Series 2 (or Season 28) in 2006 with David Tennant as the Doctor and returned once more in Episodes 12 & 13 of Series 4 2 part finale. How did filming the Doctor Who finale differ from filming The Sarah Jane Adventures?

Doctor Who is such a different animal, it’s like our big brother. Actually, the Sarah Jane Adventures sound man told me that it’s much harder for him than Doctor Who as there’s so much more dialogue! My dialogue has to be really precise as well, I can’t paraphrase my stuff as it’s explaining the plot!

Do you think Sarah Jane and any of her assistants will feature in Doctor Who again?

I don’t know, I didn’t think I’d be coming back after ‘School Reunion’! I thought I’d had a lovely goodbye, but then I came back again! Never say never, definitely.

This time last year, the newspapers were reporting about all the recent companions coming back for the Series 4 finale. At what point did you know you’d be returning?Oh, I knew quite a long time back! People were asking me about it and I had to just go “oh, that’s news to me!”. Now that David Tennant has announced he’s leaving Doctor Who next year, who would you like to see as the next Doctor?

Jason Isaacs is an incredibly talented actor, I think he’d bring real gravitas to it - and he’s also from Liverpool! Or maybe Hellboy! The actor who plays Hellboy [Ron Perlman], it’d be brilliant to have a big Doctor with a bit of muscle! I imagine Steven Moffat has his own plan though, it’s quite exciting! I’d love to work with him, but I really don’t think I’ll be coming back to Doctor Who again now. Bringing people back was more Russell’s thing.